Art In The Millennial Era

Draft Introduction to a forthcoming reader on Art in the Millennial Era

Social Context

The Millennials were the sons and daughters of the Boomers. Less defined by the usual technology framework, the Millennial generation was characterized by the values inherited from their parents, positively and negatively, and which were expected to revitalize in the new Millennium. Those values were predominantly vestiges from the 60s, which the Boomers idealized in the 90s:— the politics and the art of the 60s, and the alleged unity of politics and art in their culture and counterculture set the terms of debate for the Millennial generation. Art should be political, but it should also be of prime importance, upholding the highest aspirations of autonomous bourgeois Art. In the post-Nietzschean 60s, music is life, and music is a protest against society in many ways; but Boomer society institutionalized this musical protest, and inadvertently instilled in their children the supremacy of institutions. These are the terms of debate in which the Millennials grew up, were born into, in media res. And this vexed relationship of politics and art characterizes art in the Millennial era, still haunting it like a spectre. This reader is the story of the highest aspirations, and the greatest critical failures, of artists in the Millennial era to overcome the hopes and restrictions of their parents. It is the Oedipal story of not only an attempt to redeem the values of their parents ~ consciously or unconsciously ~ but also a frustrated rebellion against the ideas of culture inherited from them. This reader is the expression of a question that, like a deeply buried kernel, formed Millennial consciousness, yet Millennials were unable to ask in an articulate way: — Could it be that the terms of debate themselves are the problem? This is the story of a generation adventurously seeking deeper historical consciousness, but spiraling into more profound depths of barbarism. This is the story of a generation at war with its parents, but moreso at war with itself with how to properly deal with the culture that birthed them, that put paintbrushes and protest signs in their infant hands.

If, as Michael Fried apparently once said, Art is where the Bourgeoisie staked their tents, the same could be said for the Millennials. The art school phenomenon was a Millennial phenomenon; the great music diaspora, from hipster culture, to the explosion of streaming, to the (poorly) reanimated corpses of Opera and Painting, are all products of the Millennial obsession with Art. Though not constructed by the Millennials, the Chelsea gallery system was made for them; it was their adult playground. The Millennials staked their ambitions in Art, presumed to be the highest and most important achievement of our species. Perhaps rightly so. In this sense, the Millennial era is nothing more than the ongoing Bourgeois revolution, and in this sense, the Millennials' overestimation of the powers of Art are, at worst, another expression of Neoliberalism. At best ~ and it’s a best that’s become rare ~ an attempt at redeeming the power of artifice for the sake of life. By the 2010s, this high esteem wore thin, and was driven to more synthetic reconstructive efforts. The contemporary art world ~ made for the Millennials ~ was overtaken by, but also abandoned by, the Millennials. At very least it was challenged, even if only incoherently and perhaps merely as a way to reform it. The Reformative Millennials. Indeed, the Millennials are the Oedipal murderers of contemporary art, sacrificed in the springtime of the new century, as much as they are its ideologues. This is the story of the infantile rebellion against Art, as well as those who tried to salvage Art in various, often reactionary ways. This is the story of those Millennials who rejected the terms of debate, and went underground, who were exiled or self-exiled, as well as the Millennials who ascended to uncritically take control of their parents' institutions. It is a story of social struggle and atomization overspilling from the white cube.

And yet, this is the story of a war for and against culture without clear stakes. What, exactly, is the prize? If the Millennials were the product of the Boomers, this only means they were the product of Postmodernism. And Postmodernism was the rejection of aesthetic experience, it was "anti-aesthetic" in more ways than even its author was able to articulate. While the Millennials fought with their existence for Art, they also were not taught what it was, and pitched their triumphant flags on a swamp. If the endgame of art is neither enlightenment nor a means to change society, what is its meaning? The Millennials were generally unable to comprehend the deeper significances of aesthetic experience, and just as often rejected it outright in PoMo fashion. And yet, many sought to recover the origins. By the 10s, many Millennials were hard-pressed to discover what, exactly, they were fighting for. Was it merely a PoMo performative protest, or was it something more spiritually profound? Instead of reading E-Flux, Millennials returned to Kant, Hegel, and Adorno. The culture of their parents was found lacking, and in a kind of existential panic, they sought to uncover what, in the deepest sense of the term Art, their entire existence was built on. This is also the story of what they found under that overturned rock. But more than the object of their finding, this is the story of their reaction, this is the story of the Millennial grimace at the confrontation with art history. 

In 2009, a few of us sat down with The Last Marxist and Art Historian Chris Cutrone to discuss a Platypus panel on art and politics. As we considered what we wanted to learn from it, Chris suggested that it should be about the naturalization of Postmodernism. In other words, it should clarify what the stakes of art might be in a cultural situation in which Postmodernism just became the default culture, lost any vestige of self-critical consciousness, and just became an institution. Contemporary art, even then, seemed to be on the verge of becoming a postmodern style of social decoration, and not a very interesting one. Little more than decorum. What might be the stakes of Art in such a culture? Is Art doomed to kitsch — "high-class trash" — as Cutrone characterized it? Is it even possible to develop historical aesthetic consciousness in a PoMo culture that is incoherently metaphysical? Is art of no importance because it is of prime importance? Vice versa? Has Art become as dominant as it is meaningless? Is there even an audience for fine art and aesthetic experience in the Millennial era that generally rejected aesthetics? What about the questionable taste inherited from the PoMo generation, is it propitious at all to make art for newly formed brutes in a new brutish millennia? Many of us asked ourselves, after Buck-Morss — should we opt to go underground, content with crafting so many messages in so many bottles? But if we do, won't the brutes just inherit the world? Questions of practice emerge — when to fight, and when to let go. Perhaps there’s a tendency to “doth protest too much?” Or is making art in the genre of silence the highest form of dissent? This inquiry represents those questions, and much more, that characterize Millennial aporia. They remain without clear answer. But this is not some mealy-mouthed open-ended inquiry — rather, these questions demand answers. The nails need to be put in the coffins.

Love of Art / Hatred of Art. Zealously Pro-Art, doggedly Anti-Art. This is the oscillating charge that motivates the Millennial mind. On countless occasions I'd enthusiastically discuss new music with Caesura co-founder Adam Rothbarth, excited for its newness and the feelings of possibility it inspires … only to be followed with a profound panic, asking, What does it really mean? Does it fall on deaf ears? The Millennial era is defined by such doing-and-undoing, pursuit of success/fear of success, hedonism and fear of pleasure. No sooner do Millennials cobble an entire culture than they burn it to the ground. Millennial self-disgust and fear of success predominate. The Millennials created the holy grail of music streaming, only to burn it down. Millennials were all about embracing the new technology … until they became anti-technology. The Millennials adopted the gallery culture, only to smear its walls. The Millennials recreated Art in their image, only to forsake it for politics. And when the Millennial Left died in its nascent youth circa 2016? What then? Ah, now we care about Art! Now we paint, as in the 19th century. Now we write opera. Now we get serious about this Art thing. Nothing has been more a kick in the pants to Millennial Art than the death of the Millennial Left after Trump. But is this flip-flopping between protest and Art really a meaningful integration? How long will it last this time? If anything, it belies no integration at all! Contra art and politics separatism, so to speak, this reader is the story of attempts at integration. A survey of so many failures, to be sure. But nonetheless, the relationship of art and politics — of socially engaged art, as it used to be called, contra formal art, for lack of better term — is the great cultural plot of the Millennial era. The relationship of Art's social existence to it's aesthetic autonomy is the great motivator of the times, and as in some inferno of culture, some “vulgar cauldron of culture” (Melville), artists fall around all its sides. And yet the preponderance of contradictions does not at all imply that an averaging Millennial Grey is a sufficient synthesis!

From the perspective of a budding Millennial in the early 00s, the art world appeared small, unimportant, unchallenging, and easy to reject without even an iota of disgust, in the name of more ambitious artistic and life scopes. The art world was but a fleeting glint in the eye of the young hopefuls who inherited a new Millenium. Of what use is a dusty institution on a frontier? Does anyone even remember the feeling of Y2K — the magnificent possibilities of social change felt by the nascent Millennial youth? How quickly a generation jaded over! There wasn’t even reason to dislike the art world — it was too small to even think about. But also that meant it was there for the taking. Indeed, the Millennials “took” the art world they were also suspicious of. It was an accommodation, a compromise. But of what? It’s perhaps irretrievably forgotten. Now the former cute little molehill of the art world appears as an impenetrable behemoth, perhaps more violent in its looming appearance of falling. Timber! Those who could not actually take it are consigned to shaking their fists at it. While those who have taken it ~ those Millennials who perhaps always fetishized the institution of art above art itself ~ find themselves presiding over an empire of dirt. They inevitably find themselves in a missionary position, salvagers and ideologues of the “contemporary” trying, futilely, to convince the public of its salience. This reader is the reminder of the feeling of possibility, of new life in a new Millenium, now petrified, even now valued as a calcified object, a special Millennial Jade product peddled by the resigned, cynical, and shortsighted. And what of those who hoped for more?

And yet! The Millennials are not dead! They’re still trying to grasp art’s social problem … but not quite able to go the distance. In 2016 a major museum director asked me (her assistant) if I knew anyone who did art history but with a social basis (ie the social history of art, though she could not articulate it that way). I responded with “Yes, they’re rare, but isn’t that why you hired me? Haven’t you read Caesura?” No, it wasn’t, and no, she hadn’t. Institutions apparently seek the remedy to their problems, but, operating within a myopically limited politesse they’re unable to sincerely confront the deeper issues. They are beholden to the boardroom consensus and bottom political party line, not art historical consciousness. Will artists take up the problem in their absence? And if so, will such artists have to remain underground? Tbd! They say the greatest transition of wealth is imminent — when the Boomers die, their Millennial children will inherit their barbarically hoarded treasures, of which the institution “Art” is the exalted prize. But this also means the Millennials will inherit their jobs, their institutions, and decide if they want to reproduce what their parents started. In the ensuing decades, the Millennials will fully occupy the museums, the galleries, the music industry, and probably create more industries — the Millennials are a glut of self-loathing contradictions, but ambitiously industrious nonetheless. What then? Will the new culture be conditioned by more aporia, self-loathing, and contradictions? Is there even another way for art in the modern world writ large? This reader is not an academic exercise, it is an attempt to find  a way of living in the world as creators, a way of creating our world, an attempt to overcome jaded aporia. The Millennials will inevitably continue to shape the 21st century, but in what ways?

//

cover image: Jon Rafman, 9 Eyes of Google Street View

ART IN THE MILLENNIAL ERA
A TIMELINE

Early 00s
Millennial Contemporary

Y2K; Naturalization of Postmodernism; Institutionalization of new media, Photography, Sound Art, Video Art, Relational Aesthetics; Net Art & optimism for WWW; Art-science hybrids; Art History challenged by Visual Studies; Chelsea as art mecca; Computer music; Indie culture; Birth of the Hipster; Design as art; DIY. Possibility!

~ Post-9/11 Anxiety & Millennial Excitement ~
Much installation art & large-scale multimedia work — Taboos on Painting — Sculpture in an ever-expanding field.

Late 00s
The Drone Years

Relational Aesthetics takes "The Social Turn" (Bishop) merging with nascent Millennial Left; Primacy of sculpture: expanded, soft, & "Unmonumental"; Predominance of French theory & post-conceptual art ("Misconceptual" - Storr); Rise of Arts Administration & museum studies bureaucracy; Reign of The Curator-Intellectual; Hasty rise of (unsustainable) Millennial art stars; Return of Noise/drone Music & institutionalization of Experimental Music; Performance Art claimed by Millennials; Pitchfork hipsters regiment music to questionable Millennial taste; Kanye integrates rap & electronic antagonism; Vaporwave & retro-vintage middlebrow contra Avant-Garde Futurism; Some vaguely gothic & witchy stuff.

~ When Drone Music & Actual Drones Occupy the Air ~ 
Split between socially engaged art & formal art:— the major plot of the century — Lumpen  "community" vs. Market — False dichotomies start to condition contemporary art & create origins of its ultimate collapse.

Early 10s
Millennial Middlebrow

Critique & academicization of Social Art; Fabrication of Post-Internet Art & origins of turn against tech culture/WWW; Institutionalization of Millennial Performativity & "the body"; Hints of return to Painting; Girls reflects Milllenial Brooklyn & everyone shudders looking in the mirror; Emergence of music streaming/DIY publishing & crisis of music label culture; Everyone writing autobiographical novel or narcissistic memoir; Neo-Modernism tendencies; Kanye consolidates Millennial hipster music genre diaspora into pop; Return of Critical Theory & very quickly it's vulgarization; Everything Millennial grey/faux-serious; Craft gets PoMo-theoretical justification; Millennial professionalization. 

~ Occupy & Height of Millennial Left ~
Return of painting amidst discontent with new media/PoMo  — Sophist novelists confessing they've never had an aesthetic experience —  Smartism — Millennial academicization of theory, not merely in schools, but antiquarian sensibilities more generally.

Late 10s
RIP Contemporary Art 

Return of Poetry; Black is back & now painterly; IdPol "painted protest" art origins (Kissick) consolidation with social artists & liquidation into market, state, and academy; Institutionalization of "community"; Inflating market for mediocre/minor painting; Reactionary return of figurative painting contra abstraction; Ambient & middlebrow electronic music populism; Return of art-for-art's-sake, art appreciation & origins of "The Aesthetic Turn"; "Crisis of art criticism" concerns; Liquidation of the independent Curator into arts administration; Art therapy values (re)emerge; Tasteless immersive art spectacles for the masses; Art hotels.

~ Contemporary Art After Trump Liquidates Into Democratic Party ~ 
CA loses credibility even as it tries & fails to convincingly synthesize politics with aesthetics — General disenchantment with gallery/museum system & its supporting education (MFAs) — Arts Administration sensibilities predominate / reign of the art bureaucrats & idealization of State-controlled art — The Moral Turn — Many artists go underground — Deepening polarization of political art and formal art in wake of failure to integrate.

Early 20s
Art After Contemporary Art

Culture wars 2.0 farce; Return of tonality and Neoclassical academicism; Return of Beauty and classical tradition; Figurative Painting bloat; Future-is-female kitsch; Reconsideration of History Painting & Social Realism; Eclipse of conceptual art; Malaise of Video & Sound Art; Reconsideration of spirituality & art (e.g. Catholicism, Angelicism, New Age music); Tasteless tech bro "red chip" art / NFT bloat & rapid decay; Predominance of virtuality & its discontents; Emergence & rejection of AI art via Neo-Luddite arts & crafts values; Crisis of experimental music via decline into performativity; Decline of the postmodern art magazines (e.g. AF), challenged by new marginal art criticism self-publishing; Overflow & redistribution of fine artists into pop-middlebrow culture; Art & art therapy distinction collapses. Post-Occupy Millennial artists blame rent for their manifold failures.

~ Cultural Realignment Moment ~ 

Re-evaluation of values — Potentially new sectarian era of art & art criticism — Millennials confront cultural stagnation & possible nihilism, even as they finally gain control of institutions — Crisis of taste — Remaining task of grasping & integrating formal & social art.

//